Blast from the past.

Several years ago for Christmas, one of the kids put a very special little something into my stocking: A Bonne Bell Lip Smacker, jumbo sized, strawberry-flavored. It was a very sweet gesture, because they’d remembered my junior high tale of woe…

About how ALL the cool kids used to wear their Bonne Bells around their neck. And how I didn’t have one. All those delicious flavors, and none of them were mine.  No Dr. Pepper. No Mint Chocolate. No Cotton Candy. Oh, the tragedy!

I noticed today that my precious, present-day strawberry Bonne Bell is just about down to bare plastic. Crossing my fingers, I searched Amazon to no avail. All that’s available now are the miniature lip smackers – a pale imitation of the coveted jumbo size.

That search made me remember some of the other ultra-cool trends of my tween years.

Ahhhh…Love’s Baby Soft. I can still recall the powdery scent. I did have my own bottle of this little treasure. A good memory, until I ran across an ad for the product, from back in the day:

I have another caption suggestion for this ad: “Love Cosmetics, catering to the discriminating pedophile.” Sick, sick, sick.

And then there was that most sought-after shoe, the sky blue Nike. I had to do without this little number, as our family didn’t have the right kind of bank balance to shop in the upscale shoe stores in mall.

When it came time for the 9th grade graduation dance, some of my best friends were decked out in the very highest fashion of the day, a Gunne Sax dress.

I went Gunne-Saxless. Instead I wore a perfectly lovely formal dress my mom had in her closet, which she’d never worn. It actually looked great on me, but I couldn’t get over the fact that it didn’t have the right tag and didn’t have the flowing folds of gauzy fabric and lace. I managed to console myself with the fact that my date for the dance was one of the two boys in our group who actually had a driver’s license AND a car – a baby blue Mustang, no less. And I managed to ignore the fact that this kid, though cute, was about as interesting as a damp rag.

Some bittersweet memories, for sure.

I wonder what kind of memories our kids will have of those tween and early teen years. Being who they are, they’ll probably look back fondly on Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings, 7:30 am pre-algebra class, music lessons, and family camping trips.

I think their blasts from the past will be much more satisfying.

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